An Iranian Perspective

It really is.

- As I pointed out in the previous post the whole “election” was a sham.

- The communication networks have been blocked: The national sms network (which is a primary ource of communicating information in a nation of 70% youth) was disconnected since the night before the elections (an early sign …). The mobile phones and even the phone booths on the streets were interrupted in Tehran on Saturday afternoon, don’t know what status they are in now. Almost all decent news sites are filtered (since saturday: also facebook and youtube … again). Actually the internet itself is barely connected since they have reduced the bandwith to a trickle.

- Crackdown on whoever opposes: There are beating up people who are still protesting in the main streets of Tehran and various other cities (Mashhad, Shiraz, Rasht, Babol, Karaj … I really wonder why we haven’t heard anything of Tabriz since it’s the largest Azari province and the votes ust be most manipulated there … heard something about there too after writing this). They are using at least clubs and tear gas, and  shooting in the air (not to people …  yet (it was so painful for me to type these three letters)).

- Arrets: Many people have been arrested. I mean politicians from a wide spectrum of the Iranian political arena, that would still be considered “insiders” up to now. in addition to those who would be considered “opposition”. I put these in quotes because these lines are being more blurred in recent years, and are being totally undermined now. From the first group most of the leadership of the Mosharekat (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_Iran_Participation_Front) have been arrested at their meeting, such as Mirdamadi, Zohre Aghajari, Tajzade, and Ramezanzadeh,  ansd also Mohammad Reza Khatami along with his wife who is the granddaughter of Khomeini himself. Of the opposition, some members of the melli-mazhabis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nationalist-Religious): Taghi Rahmani, Reza Alijani, and Hoda Saber. Various reporters and political analysts and activists have also been arrested, e.g. 30 reporters of the Etemad Melli newspaper (Karroubi’s paper), Ahmad Zeidabadi (political analyst, also part of the melli-mazhabi’s). Even a veteran revolutionary politician from the left who is not at all borderline “opposition” like Behzad Nabavi has been arrested, they broke into his house.

- Arresting the leaders: There are various rumors about what has become of the reformist candidates themslevs, and the other higher level leaders on their side, these are all rumors: they say that Mousavi, Karroubi, and Hashemi Rafsanjani are under house arrest. Nobody knoiws for sure, but there is barely any news from them so it makes sense. There are not even any rumors about where Khatami is, weird.

- I’m writing only things that I’m pretty sure are true (I’ll specify if I find it to be just a rumor). References exist for most of them, but I don’t have time to provide links to them now.  Some of them I’ve got from sources that I trust. You can never be positive about anything in such circumstances, but I try to leave out anything unreliable.

- So check out the definition here: coup d’état

Does it all make sense now?